A virtual world is a computer simulated environment. A virtual world may resemble the real world, with real world rules such as physical rules of gravity, geography, topography, and locomotion. A virtual world may also incorporate rules for social and economic interactions between virtual characters. Players (users) may be represented as avatars, two or three-dimensional graphical representations. Virtual worlds may be used for massively multiple online role-playing games, for social or business networking, or for participation in imaginary social universes.
Virtual goods are non-physical objects purchased for use in virtual worlds, online communities or online games. Virtual goods trading which may include buying and/or selling digital gifts, digital clothing for avatars, tokens etc. is a growing market. Social gaming is another market segment that is growing fast and one of its integral components is branded virtual goods market.
Thus in general the virtual goods trading market is growing as people become more used to the ideas of trading online and playing games on non-traditional portable terminals e.g. iPhone, iPad, Smartphones etc.
Prior art virtual worlds where virtual goods are traded are designed such that the seller assigns a value to a virtual good in an electronic transaction. The seller of a virtual good may be an online company or a brand (in case of the branded virtual goods) or a person who owns or has the rights to trade the virtual good. Thus prior art virtual worlds lack the ability to take other factors into account for ascribing value to virtual goods. Our invention overcomes these limitations of the prior art and provides a unique method and a system for virtual goods trading.